In order to truly understand racism, we need to understand where it comes from. I would guess that many black folks have a basic understanding of the beginnings. And in the same vein, I would guess that most white folks don’t.

One of the biggest problems surrounding race relations in this country is that the powers that be have worked really hard to eliminate the harshest parts of the history of racism. We are still close enough to it in time that black folks have the legacy of it in their families through oral traditions, as well as systemic and cultural trappings. They must keep talking about it because it’s necessary for their family’s safety.

White folks have no need of continuing the discussion of racism. Generally speaking, whites have the privilege of exemption from worrying that one of our children will be killed for their skin color. Clearly, there are exceptions to this rule, like parents of biracial children.

Once slavery and the Jim Crow era were erased from our law books, the educational system began erasing it from our history books. White families didn’t sit around talking about the good old days of slavery and segregation (well, not all of them anyway). It has become our shameful past. People rarely discuss shameful histories in earnest.

And while the basics of slavery are still in our history books, we don’t discuss the long-term ramifications that it had on the people who underwent slavery. Ergo, we don’t talk about how we can fix it.

But in this post, I’m looking far earlier than slavery, because that’s not how racism started. Slavery (as well as the Holocaust) in the U.S. was the pinnacle and the boiling point, but there were circumstances that made it possible.

So with that intro, I decided a while back that I needed to understand with more clarity how we got there in the first place.

This book starts long before slavery and examines the reasons why slavery was even able to happen in the first place.

For starters, racism was invented. Yep. It’s not evolutionary. It’s an invention by mankind. I think this is a powerful thing to know. Because if we can invent it, then that means we are not controlled by it under some genetic force. And if we can invent it, then we can erase it. It’s also important to point out because it forces us to all acknowledge that those uncomfortable and/or fearful feelings we get in certain times and around certain places are something that we learned. They are not based on some natural instinctual need for survival.

Next up, this is important to understand. Racism is not just feeling.

“But racism as I conceive it is not not merely an attitude or set of beliefs; it also expresses itself in the practices, institutions and structures that a sense of deep differences justifies or validates.”

Racism is still alive and well in our country. Just because our brown skinned brothers and sisters are free and potentially able to have the same opportunities as whites, doesn’t mean that they do. Many of our institutions are set up to deny them access based on various sets of factors.

“It (racism) either directly sustains or proposes to establish a racial order, a permanent group hierarchy that is believed to reflect the laws of nature or the decrees of God.”

How Racism Started

Sooo, just how did racism begin, you want to know?

One word. Religion.

Yup. That’s right.

Shocking, I know.

The origins of racism didn’t actually start with hatred toward African people. There is no proof that hatred of dark skin existed in the ancient world. It all started with Christians and Jews.

“The notion that Jews were collectively and hereditarily responsible for the worst possible human crime– deicide– created a powerful incentive for persecution.”

That was only the beginning, however. All this did was allow for one group of people to oppress another group of people. Jews were given the option of conversion, which would absolve them of their cultivated crime. This did not meet the criteria to be considered racism because it was something they could change. To be considered racist, the oppressed person must have characteristics that are inherent and unchangeable.

This persecution didn’t end with the Jews, however. It was extended to the Slavs and the Irish in Europe.

“As the core of Catholic Europe expanded, conquering and colonizing the periphery of the continent attitudes of superiority to indigenous populations anticipated the feelings of dominance and entitlement that would characterize the later expansion of Europeans into Asia, Antartica and the Americas.”

In Medieval Europe, intolerance extended to just about any group, “whose beliefs or behavior smacked of heresy or deviance at a time when religious and moral conformity were being demanded…”

At this point, you may be saying to yourself, “But this has nothing to do with racism. Religious persecution is not the same thing. And we all know that the Jews were persecuted for their beliefs.”

Yes, you’re right.

It seems at this point that white over black racism did not have direct roots in the Medieval European religious persecution. But in a moment, you will see how it happened quite quickly. Read on.

Throughout the late Middle Ages, there were signs that religious persecution was turning toward racial persecution. During the Spanish Inquisition, there were many Jews who chose to convert rather than be expelled. This created suspicion that they were secret Jews, rather than true converts. This led to what some would say an inevitable consequence of defining those who had “Jewish blood,” thus leading to the doctrine, “limpieza de sangre” or “purity of blood.” This eventually lead to laws and the necessity of blood purity certificates needed to enter into specific institutions and organizations.

“It is also highly significant that from the very beginning of the settlement of the Americas, only those thought to be of pure Christian ancestry were permitted to join the ranks of the conquistadores and missionaries.”

So how does this connect to American racism and slavery?

As you may know, slavery was not a new concept for America. During history, slaves had been kept all over the world. They were also various colors and generally speaking, slavery was not based on skin color, but on your station in life. Even Africans participated in slavery. They had their own slaves and there were African slave traders who helped capture and sold slaves to the Europeans.

But slavery is not the same as racism. However, racism was necessary in order to convert continued slavery into racism.

See, at this point, late in the 17th century, slavery was alive and well in the U.S. And it was also at this point that race began to play a larger factor in who were slaves and who weren’t. The Catholics were still working out which set of people were inherently evil sinners. There was some question about whether the Africans were cursed, because initially they were thought to have darker skin due to their climate. But the Brazilians were noted to have much lighter skin, even though they came from a similar climate.

At the same time, it was noted by explorer Alexander von Humboldt that, “In Spain it is a kind of title of nobility not to descend from Jews or Moors. In America, the skin, more or less white, is what dictates the class that an individual occupies in society. A white, even if he rides barefoot on horseback, considers himself to be a member of the nobility of the country.”

However, there was a problem. So far, it was considered that baptism could absolve a person from their inherited curses. The Jews had always been given the option of converting rather than being killed or expelled.

This notion of absolution, and impending freedom from captivity, became a major problem for white slave owners.

“Relatively little mission work was carried out among the slaves because of the masters’ expectation that baptism would give them a claim to freedom.”

So, remember that curse? The one that Africans might have because of having darker skin than the Brazilians?

The curse had been common knowledge among slave traders since the sixteenth century and used as an explanation of why Africans had much darker skin.

“Racial identities were fixed for all time by divine decree… that consigned blacks to perpetual slavery.”

The U.S. cemented the curse into law in the late seventeenth century in Virginia a “made it clear that conversion did not entail freedom.”

And so slavery was, at that point, clearly defined on race, and nothing else.

The Ending

This book was very enlightening and goes on to explain the rise of modern racism and racism in the twenty first century. The history of religious persecution and how it directly relates to slavery is also outlined in much better detail. I should note, for my Christian readers, that there were some Christian thought leaders of the time who spoke out against enslavement. But they were clearly in the minority and other than writing against it, nothing much else was done in favor of the African slaves.

If you are interested in more on the history of racism, I highly recommend this book .

I’m so angry about the stupidity surrounding the story about the white lesbians who accidentally received some African American sperm and ended up with a biracial baby.

Jennifer Cramblett with her daughter Payton.

Last week this story broke about two white lesbians, suing the sperm bank for receiving an African American man’s sperm, rather than the white, blue-eyed blonde haired man’s sperm they had ordered. Ok, I know on the surface this could look like these women are bigots. But they aren’t and I’ll tell you why.

In a nutshell, two white lesbians in Ohio ordered some sperm and came out with a black baby. According to the court documents, they bonded with the baby and love her very much. But for the past two years they have been running into problems connected to her race. First of all, they live in a very bigoted town. Secondly, the grandparents are bigoted. And thirdly, they have to travel to a more racially diverse area to get their daughter’s hair cut, where they feel unwelcome.

Ok, that third one does make them look a little like bigots. Facing your own white privilege comes with some challenges. They are still early on in their journey toward learning how to talk about race, for sure.

Right now, and for the past two years, I can guarantee that they have been facing their own internalized white privilege. Now, they are publicly discussing why having a child of another race is difficult for them. Admitting that parenting a child of another race has subjected them to taunts and accusations from both sides of the racial coin.

White folks are horrified that a white person would admit they feel challenged by parenting a black child. It forces the white community to admit that racism still exists. It sure is a lot easier to just call them racists and go back to their quiet little lives where no white people are racists unless they talk about race.

And on the other side of the coin, some African American writers are mocking the white folks who have been “inconvenienced” by blackness. It’s not an inconvenience to raise a child of color. It’s a joy, just like raising any child. But for white parents raising a child of color, there comes the added emotional expense of coming to realizations that their skin color changes the way you have to parent and live your life. It comes with the realization that their skin color could subject them to violence. There comes with it the knowledge that they will experience hate in forms that you, as a white parent, cannot possibly understand how it feels. They will experience institutionalized prejudice at school. They will experience prejudice from well-meaning, yet ignorant, older, family members. They will see the disparities in the toy section, and so too, will you. And it will piss you off. They will read multitudes of books where their skin color is either completely left out, or used with derision, sometimes purposeful, sometimes not. They will watch television shows where they are always in the minority or being used as a stereotype. You, as a parent, will also see these things and you’ll feel guilty and angry at the same time.

If you were unprepared to deal with that as a parent, it’s fucking scary to come to those realizations as your child is growing up and it’s happening right in front of your eyes. I wonder if African Americans come to those same realizations in the same manner, or if they feel prepared for it beforehand? I would imagine that it is a horrendous mixture of prior knowledge and new fears that come with being a parent. Raising a black child in this country is tough. It forces you to acknowledge that everything in this country is set up for white people to be successful and to oppress black people. And if you’re not prepared for it, then you need support in forms of community and mental health.

In any case, Jennifer Cramblett and her partner are suing for approximately $50,000 and are planning on moving to a more diverse community. They need extra money for moving expenses and regular therapy.

This seems pretty damn reasonable to me.

If these women were ignorant or racist, as the articles and comments are suggesting, then they could have easily given up the baby for adoption and gotten some more sperm, quietly and without any fuss. Rather, they fell in love with the child who Jennifer Cramblett carried for nine months. They have been raising her and giving her love for two years. They have been worrying about her future. They sound like pretty typical parents to me.

To me, this tells me that they love her unconditionally, but they are smart enough to realize that they are going to face some challenges. This tells me that these women are being practical about what life holds for their family. Shit costs money. The sperm bank was incompetent. Jennifer and Amanda need to change the way they live in order to raise Payton successfully. Not to mention, that the sperm bank should be held accountable for their mistake, another practical reason for the lawsuit.

I’ve seen comments calling these women hateful bigots. Really?

Anyone who is a part of the LGBT community has had to endure plenty of bigotry in their lives. There is only so much social justice a body can stand up for without having some sort of mental breakdown. These are the things that keep people up at night.

I don’t know these women, but I’m guessing they’ve endured bigotry enough to last a lifetime. And now on top of all that, they now have to raise a child in a world they were, admittedly(!), completely unprepared for. Saying, in public, that they know raising a black child is a challenge and they feel fucking scared to do it, is brave. So brave.

But they are taking on that task because they love their daughter. I give them props for being brave enough to file this lawsuit to bring to the forefront the challenges of raising a black child in a white world. To admit their fear. And to expose that fear to their community.

These women are not the bigots here. They have clarity of mind. They see their world for what it is and they are publicly admitting that they cannot raise their daughter there. Because they love her. They are doing what good parents do. Protecting their child.

Not only that, they are brave enough to publicly acknowledge the white privilege aspects of their own world that they have had to challenge in their own minds. That’s not bigotry folks. It’s bravery.

It’s not easy to admit in public that, as a white person, you are being forced to acknowledge ugliness in your world due to your skin color.

I’m sure that these women are not perfect. But what parent is?

Sure, it’s possible this lawsuit will have a negative effect on their daughter’s self esteem as some are suggesting. But who knows, perhaps she will see the challenges her mothers faced and be inspired. Hopefully they will use this part of their past to show her that she should always stand up for herself, rather than let the world tell you you’re wrong, when you know you’re right.

We picked up Lola Reads to Leo a few weeks ago and Annika was very charmed by it. It’s a sweet, simple book, really for slightly younger kids, more for 3-4 year olds, but she still likes simple storybooks sometimes even though we are reading chapter books for most our nighttime reading now.

Annika enjoyed this book because it was about a little girl whose mom is pregnant. Her parents are prepping her for her new little brother Leo. When Leo finally arrives, Lola tells him stories. She reads to him while he is nursing. She reads to him while he is getting his diaper changed (and while she is on the potty). She reads to him while he’s in the bathtub. And big sister reads to him while he is tired. She tells him her best “sleepy story.”

Lola is becoming a big sister and as the story progresses, she matures. She is a big sister and she helps her mommy and daddy. But at the end of the day she reads her little brother another story.

Lola Reads to Leo is just the type of book that parents with children of color are always on the lookout for. It’s not about race or slavery or segregation. It’s just a nice story with people who happen to look more like our family. And that, is why I like it.

Lola Reads to Leo is written by author Anna McQuinn, a British children’s author who has written a number of storybooks with children of color as well as books with white children and books with both as friends. I think we will definitely be checking out more of her books.

Pick it up here on Amazon or check it out at your local library, like I did.

Annika has always liked the illustrations in stories as much as the stories themselves. Around age 3, she insisted, more than once, on checking out some Japanese anime books even though we couldn’t read them and the story lines were most likely not even appropriate for her age level. She just liked looking at the pictures.

As for me, I’ve never been one for comics much, but she likes comic books too. I haven’t introduced her to many comics, mostly because it’s not my thing and therefore, not on my radar, but I was thrilled to find this post over on Planet Jinxatron, 11 Good Comics for Kids. We started out with her first recommendation, Luke on the Loose (Toon) mostly because, as Skye points out, it’s one that actually has a healthy dose of diversity, which is sadly lacking in kids comics (and most media).

Annika loved it! As a beginning reader, the text was very simple enough for her to follow along with and the graphics were interesting enough that the story kept her attention even though it’s normally not something she would be interested in. But it was perfect for her. She has taken to lying in bed some nights before bedtime looking at a book for a few minutes and this was heavy in the rotation for the first several nights that we had it around.

The story is just about a kid who chases pigeons through the big city, starting in the park, while his dad chats with another father and doesn’t notice his son running off.

When he does notice, of course there is a frantic effort to find him while Luke just continues running through the city.

I recommend this book for early readers who love graphics, with the bonus of diversity. Not only are Luke and his parents black, but the background people scattered throughout the book at a nice mixture and there’s even a biracial couple in one scene.

Check it out at your local library as I did, or get it on Amazon here:

Last month I made a pact with myself to keep a regular stream of books with good African American models for Annika. We’ve always read books with black children as much as possible, but with February being Black History Month, it was, frankly, a lot easier to pick up several at our local library with them being prominently displayed on the end shelves in the kids’ section. Now that Black History Month is over, I’m sure I will have to do my due diligence to find a good selection coming in, but I’m determined to ensure that Annika has a regular view of black children in literature, even though she doesn’t always get that in real life. Hey, it’s something.

One of her favorite books we picked up was, My Brother Charlie, by Holly Robinson Peete and Ryan Elizabeth Peete. The book wasn’t about black history. It was nice to have some books that had nothing to do with history mixed in with all the Civil Rights books we read during February.

My Brother Charlie is a story about twins, a girl and boy, Callie and Charlie. They are always together. They love the same things. But Charlie is different than Callie. Charlie has autism.

The book was written by Holly Robinson Peete and her daughter, Ryan. Ryan’s twin brother, Holly’s son, also has autism.

Annika enjoyed the book immensely because they were two kids who look like her. It was also a great book to read because, coincidentally, we have recently hung out with some friends who have two children with autism. They are friends we knew when Annika was a baby, but haven’t seen them much lately. I was able to explain to her that Charlie was similar to our friends.

This book has beautiful art and a real sense of love and belonging. It is clearly written from the perspective of a family who loves someone with Autism and they happen to have brown skin.

I liked this book for a variety of reasons, but one was because it was a kids’ book with brown-skinned children that wasn’t talking about negative aspects of our history or making a big deal about their skin color.

I highly recommend this book. It is a touching, sweet story with beautiful artwork and any child will enjoy it.

I often have difficulty pinpointing when a racist act begins. Lately, I have been giving some thought about the day-to-day effects of racism and how they might affect someone under duress.

The case of Rashad Owens gave me a lot of pause when I began reading about it in the news. In case you haven’t read about the (now) three deaths caused by this man, here is a short synopsis.

Rashad Owens Killed 3 During SXSW

Last week during South By Southwest (SXSW) a man drunkenly plowed down the wrong way of a one-way street in downtown Austin while being pursued by a policeman for a traffic stop. Owens was reportedly driving without his headlights on. (Other outlets are now reporting that he was being stopped in a sobriety checkpoint. But the original reports stated he was stopped for driving without his headlights. I think it is an important distinction that there are two reasons reported as to why he was being stopped.)

During this incident, two people were killed on the spot and as of this posting, another woman has died from her injuries. There were also 22 others injured. That man was Rashad Owens, a 21-year-old rapper from Killeen, Texas. His BAC was .114.

He was pulled over at a gas station near Interstate 35 and downtown. This is normally a congested area, so given that it was SXSW, the traffic must have been crawling. The officer initially thought Owens was stopping, but then Owens pulled through an alley and proceeded the wrong way down a one-way street where the street was blocked off and many SXSW partiers were standing in the streets.

One might wonder exactly what was it that made him choose this course of action, rather than just submitting to the police in pursuit. If it were me, I’d probably stop and take my licks. But you can bet I’d be pretty damn scared. But I’m a white woman without a sketchy past.

Upon hearing this news of the incident, I was mortified and saddened for the victims. But I have to admit, I was bothered by Police Chief Art Acevdeo’s pronunciation — even before the suspect’s name was released– that this act was “intentional.”

Rashad Owens never had a chance. It was clear from the start that the police were going to vilify Owens. And even though I am in no way absolving him of his actions, I do think that racism was involved in his behavior. And it will affect how he is viewed in the media, in the trial and in his sentencing.

Owens is already being tried in the court of social media and has been pronounced a scumbag with no regard for human life.

Some of the very first comments I saw attached to articles on this incident said things like, “Let’s string him up” and another called him a “beast.” These comments are reminiscent of stereotypes associated with slavery and Jim Crow laws.

Given that this is an internationally high profile festival and one of the people killed was from the Netherlands, making it news on the other side of the world, Owens likely to be given a pretty harsh sentence once he’s convicted, which I’m certain he will be. He faces two charges of capital murder and 23 counts of aggravated assault. (These numbers may change given that a third person has died.)

Rashad Owens clearly made some bad choices that night. I’m not disputing that. And let me be clear, I’m sickened by the results of his poor choices.

However, I want to look at this from an unbiased view about what I think of his actions that led to three deaths and 22 terribly injured people. Let’s look at this through the lens of a racist society.

The facts: Rashad Charjuan Owens is a 21-year-old black man from Killeen, Texas. He reportedly has six children. He has two more prior incidents in Alaska, a minor in possession (MIP) charge and criminal mischief charge. In one incident the charge was dismissed and the second case remains open, which he skipped out on. He also has been charged with kidnapping his own child during a custody dispute.

None of this looks good on paper. A lot of people will write him off immediately after hearing these things. But what I’m more curious about is how a person can get to be only 21 years old and already have that kind of laundry list of bad life choices.

At this point, I can only speculate about his motives on that night. But it’s not hard to speculate that this dude was running scared. He knows the facts of his life and when he saw those police lights behind him, I’m guessing he stopped thinking about anything else other than getting the hell out of there.

And you know why.

He knew without an unequivocal doubt that he was going to go to jail for a long ass time if he was caught. He knows this because he’s a black man in the United States and he’s already made several poor life choices. But does that make him a scumbag with no regard for human life? Or does it just make him a human being who is trying to survive?

Would he have been better off if he’d just stopped? Probably not. And here’s why.

Now, who knows if Rashad Charjuan Owens knows these exact statistics I’m about to share with you, but I’m guessing he knows that his odds are not good.

Approximately 12-13 percent of the U.S. population is African American. However, 40 percent of the prison population are black males.

If I were a person with those kinds of statistics and that background, I think that my incentive for running from cops would be raised significantly. As a white person, I mostly am not afraid of cops. Even when I’m in the wrong, I can count on my race and my gender to significantly decrease my chances of being punished too harshly. Rashad Owens can not. And he knew that when he was running for his life.

Let me again, say that I am not trying to absolve him of his actions. Only trying to understand them.

Rashad Owens’ Punishment Will Be More Severe Because He is Black

Now, given all these facts, you may still likely believe that Rashad Owens deserves a long jail sentence. After all, he did some pretty horrible things and whether or not he’s black, he is clearly a criminal who deserves no leniency. I might have agreed with that statement 10 or more years ago.

Ethan Couch is a white boy from Ft. Worth, who killed four people during a drunken driving spree in June 2013. He was 16 at the time. His BAC was .24 and he also tested positive for Valium. May I point out that he was not running away from anyone at the time. He was simply out for a joyride with seven of his friends in his truck, none of whom were wearing seat belts. They were wasted, he lost control of his truck and killed four people, a woman with car trouble and three good Samaritans who had stopped to help her. One of Ethan’s friends, Sergio Molina, was riding in the back and is now crippled and must be cared for around the clock by his family. Ethan Couch was given 10 years of probation and time in a cushy rehabilitation facility that would cost his parents approximately $500,000 per year. The victims’ families are pretty pissed. And yes, there has been outcry. But nonetheless, Ethan Couch isn’t doing any real time.

Oh, but you say, Couch didn’t have a string of priors!

But actually, he did. Just earlier that year, in February 2013 he had been cited for minor in possession and was sentenced to probation and community service.

If you’re white, like me, that sounds pretty reasonable for kid. But Rashad Owens’ criminal background were also rooted in MIPs. He was also charged with criminal mischief (criminal mischief is typically destroying someone else’s property) along with being a minor in possession.

Now, let’s look at Gabrielle Nestande. Nestande was a 24-year-old white Capitol staffer who drunkenly ran over a pedestrian, then went home, leaving the woman to die in the street. The next day, Nestande got up and went to work as if nothing had happened. Nestande received a sentence of six months in jail and 10 years of probation.

Ethan Couch comes from a family whose annual income is reportedly around $15 million. Gabrielle Nestande comes from a political family. Her father is Bruce Nestande, a powerful member of the GOP, who served as special assistant to Ronald Reagan. He also has a DUI/hit and run on his record for which he, too, served only six months in jail, along with probation.

Clearly, these issues are not just about race, but also about class. The same judge who gave Couch his cushy sentence has been criticized for giving harsher sentences for similar crimes and similarly aged young men, both white and black.

If you ask me, of all these three young adults, the one who sounds like he had good reason to run the most is Rashad Owens. He was literally running for his life.

If People Are All Really Equal, Then Rashad Owens Deserves Leniency Too

After looking at all of this, I think Rashad Owens deserves some leniency for his actions. I’m saddened over the deaths and injuries, but from this perspective, it seems to me that perhaps if we didn’t live in a racist country, then maybe those 25 people would still be alive/unhurt today. Perhaps Rashad Owens would have not been so worried for his life. Perhaps he would have stopped and gotten his slap on the wrist just like any white person would have gotten in his situation.

What do you say about this? Many will say no! He killed innocents! He ruined our beloved festival. He stained our upstanding community. Yes, he did. But we have to start somewhere.

Today’s guest post is from one of my newer internet friends. She is a single mama, like me. She also reminds me of myself about a decade and more ago when I started trying to really understand racism. She is Only-Mama, a blogger, a single mom, but most importantly, a deep thinker who acknowledges her lack of understanding and wants to change that in herself. I love this post because I can relate to it on many levels, on both sides of the coin, and I appreciate her taking the time to guest post for me a second time on the topic of race.

I am a white woman, primarily raised around white people. I have always considered myself to be as non-racist as possible, given my isolation from other races. In my heart, I believe I don’t judge others based on color, and I think I manage to avoid believing or perpetuating stereotypes. But sometimes I get it wrong, and my first clue is the awkward silence.

When you are a white girl like me, you say stupid things on occasion without realizing why you just said the wrong thing. For example, I had a coworker whose daughter was pregnant the same time that I was, so we talked a lot about pregnancy and infants during coffee break. One day she showed me a picture of her adorable grandbaby.

NEW GRANDMA: Isn’t she the cutest little ewok?
(baby girl has curly hair up in two round puffy ponytails on top of her head. Absolutely adorable!)
ME: She is absolutely adorable!

Later that week, grandma, me and a white coworker were looking at pictures.
ME to white coworker: Isn’t she the cutest little ewok?
NEW GRANDMA: deafening silence.

Apparently white people can’t call black babies ewoks to other white people. I wasn’t trying to be dehumanizing, I was just using her word. I didn’t know that I didn’t have a right to use it.

I had a longer discussion with a different black coworker about calling black kids monkeys.

TEE: And so WHITE FRIEND came up to me at Target and my kids were hanging off the sides of my grocery cart, and can you believe she called them monkeys?
ME: But what is wrong with that? I call my own kids monkeys all the time!
TEE: But you can’t call a black kid a monkey!
ME: But they were hanging off the cart like monkeys!
TEE: I can call them monkeys, but white people can’t.
ME: But isn’t it racist that white kids can be monkeys and black kids can’t?
TEE: Porch monkey? Hello?
(A porch monkey is a derogatory term meaning that the person is lazy. Laziness is a negative stereotype often attributed to black people.)

I had honestly never thought of that. I was glad that Tee had told her story and was willing to spell it out for me. I learned more than if she had just gone with awkward silence.

There are other negative stereotypes that are good enough reasons why black children shouldn’t be called monkeys. For a white kid, it’s not a big deal because they don’t have the background of stereotypes depicting their ancestors as sub-humans, lazy, and ignorant. But black children do, and should never be called a monkey

Now, you may think it is ridiculous that a white person would even think to call a black kid a monkey, but we don’t always think in terms of racism. If my kid is a monkey, and your kid can’t be a monkey, that’s a racial division I don’t always think of. (This is a sign of white privilege.)

Insensitivity, sure. Wrong, yes. But when you become friends with someone you don’t always remember to be sensitive, and words come out and fall on the floor with a thud met by silence.

Time and again I have put my foot in my mouth and have had no clue until I am hit by the awkward silence, and I really don’t want to be offensive. I need someone to clue me in. I don’t know how to ask for this though. When I am shown my ignorance, I don’t know how to bridge the divide my words have just made, and I really want to.

Maybe next time, instead of changing the subject, I can have the guts to say, “Wow, I obviously said something wrong! I’m sorry.” And maybe whomever I am speaking to will have the generosity to tell me why my words hurt. I want to be better, I just need a little help growing.

Only-Mama is primarily a single parenting blog where I try to examine my moments of failure as well as my successes and don’t talk about being single as much as I intended. I am occasionally deep and insightful, more often light-hearted and irrelevant, and I have a propensity to discuss my underwear more than is appropriate. Thanks toMomsoap for allowing me an opportunity to get out of my comfort zone.

Typically, I don’t get excited about classic move remakes. Okay, okay, I’m a huge grump when a beloved classic remake hits the big screen. But this one, I am fucking stoked!!

If you haven’t heard, the remake of the movie Annie is going to star Quvenzhané Wallis. The new Annie is black, THE NEW ANNIE IS BLACK!!!!

This is HUGE for us. Check this out below:

Yes, this is my child’s favorite movie! Well, okay, if you ask her on any given day, there could be a number of favorite movies. It really is one of her favorite movies. She’s watched it multiple times. She sings the songs from the movie and has even discussed how her hair is similar in texture to Annie’s. She’s going to go GA GA!

Watch the trailer here:

If you don’t think that’s a big deal, picture having a daughter who says things like this:

“Mama, all the shows I like only have one girl with brown skin.”

Or,

“How come all the best books and movies only have people with white skin, Mama?”

Or,

“Mama, look! I think my skin is getting whiter!”

And lest you wonder if somehow she’s getting the impression at home that white skin is better, you’d be severely wrong. We discuss our differences all the time. I tell her she’s beautiful. I make sure that she knows that black is beautiful. Brown is gorgeous. And her hair is simply divine. Nope, it’s not coming from anywhere but the media.

Now, the grump in me says that if not for having a daughter with brown skin, I might be not quite as excited about Annie being played by someone without red hair. Sure, I get it. Some may be disappointed.

Heck, there will be probably be an outcry. I know I won’t be able to avoid the racist, comments that are coming already happening.

But for now, I’m going to revel in this news.

And you can bet your bottom dollar that we’ll be lining up to see this movie when it comes out on Dec. 19!

(I’ll save y’all from the cheesy Sun Is Gonna Come Out Tomorrow line in my head.) But damn, I’m excited!

This is the next post in my guest series on racism, which I am extending indefinitely. I have decided that one month is not enough to devote to this topic. I want to let people have the opportunity to discuss race in an open and honest way.

This post is written by a former coworker of mine from many years ago. I like this post because it is way more raw than much of the writing here on this blog. To be frank, it is an insider’s look at an academically uneducated view on race from the white person. It is not a hateful view, but a limited one.

It does have some things in it I disagree with, academically. But instead of having the author change them to fit my views, I decided to leave them in, but I feel pressed to make sure that I point out a couple of things.

In this post, the author mentions “reverse racism.” Her views are honest. So I left it in, because the notion of “reverse racism” still runs rampant in our society.

Academically, this notion is flawed. But because white people generally do not understand racism, or feel it personally when they do not hate, it is a common misconception in the white community.

I felt it myself, for a long time, until I began to understand the difference between racism and prejudice. Anyone can be prejudiced. But according to critical race theory, racism is something that black people in America cannot be, simply because racism is too deeply ingrained in society. Because we live in a culture of institutionalized racism, one does not need to be black-hating racist in order to still be defined as a racist. You simply are because you were born into this societal fabric. On the opposing view, one can be in the minority and can hate, or be prejudiced against the majority, but that does not make that person a racist. They are simply prejudiced against the status quo.

And with that, I give you a raw and honest look at a white woman’s view on race. From love with Detroit.

Ok, let me start off by saying, I plan to be open and honest, but will probably not be.

Not that I’m going to lie, but let’s be honest here. This is a hot button topic, and anything said about race will set someone off, so you need to tread lightly.

Second thing is, I’m a bit of a rambler, I don’t really even know what I’m going to say, so bear with me.

I like to think of myself as a non-judgmental person. I don’t judge people on their race, sex, sexual orientation, religion, whatever. I do, however, judge people based on their personalities. So, I can’t understand why people would lump groups of people together based on anything other than their personalities.

My Experiences with Other Races

I grew up in a suburb of Detroit. In about the third grade I became close friends with a girl who was mixed. Mom white, dad black. Mom was remarried to a white guy, and she had a younger half brother. I never really thought anything about her being mixed, she was just my friend.

We both loved to sing and dance, her mom had a jukebox, so we would hang out at her house, playing oldies, singing and dancing.

About a year later, I had my first run in with racism. We were walking home one day, and a car started following us, pacing us. We kept walking, aware that there was someone following, but ignoring them. Next thing I know the person started yelling racist remarks, to both of us. I can’t remember exactly what they said, but I was in awe. They drove off. It was eye opening, because I realized then, that this is something she dealt with on a regular basis.

Later that year, members of the KKK were outside the school, handing out flyers, spreading their hate, and it was then I realized that there was true hate in this world.

In middle school I went to school with a new mix of kids, I added Jewish, and even more black kids to my group of friends. I again, never thought twice about it, they were people I got along with, people I liked.

I, again, was to be shocked –by a family member–when I started dating a Jewish boy. I was told that there was nothing wrong with people who were Jewish, but that I shouldn’t date them. I was also told the same thing, when I later, started dating black boys.

None of this changed my views, I still looked at people as people. I didn’t understand why, when I went to the mall with my friends who were black, we were followed through the department stores by the employees there, in fact, asked to leave the store at one point, when all we were doing was walking through the store to get to the main part of the mall.

Feeling My Own Prejudice

In high school I was lucky enough to be invited to be part of the Horizons Upward-Bound program. It’s a wonderful program, that includes kids from Pontiac, Detroit and Berkley. To be invited, you have to pass tests, be the first member of your family to attend college, be from a low income family, and have a high IQ.

During the summer, we stayed on campus, at the Cranbrook Academy of Art, for six weeks. We slept in the dorms, and on weekend, we had free run of the campus. This was when I feel I fully understood what it must feel like to be a minority. The very first day I was there, after I got my room, I went to the cafeteria, to eat lunch and I was taken aback. I didn’t know anyone at all in the room, not even anyone from my own city of Berkley.

There were, say, 400 students there, and maybe 40 of them were white, and included in the white students were people of Hispanic origin, Asians, and Middle Easterners.

I had never been in that situation. I was scared. Not because of any reason other than, I was the minority, I didn’t fit in. I found my roommate, who was Hispanic, and we went and sat at a table together in the back. There were two tables, further back, but those were only for the Seniors. The rest of the table was all white.

But as the summers went on, I made a lot of friends there. From Detroit, and Pontiac. My Sophomore year I had my eyes opened, yet again. That was the year I discovered “reverse racism”

I was dating a black guy, and a couple of his friends (black), were dating other white girls. We were all a big group of friends, so we were all pretty close. The boys informed us one day that a teacher had them stay after class so he could talk to them about dating white girls. He thought it was a shame that they would date white girls when there were perfectly fine black girls to date, that if they kept doing this, they would be killing their race.

I was again in awe, and lost complete respect for this teacher. And it was then I realized that no matter what race you were, you could be racist.

I’ve learned things in my adult life, how racist people are.

I have had to wait on people that I knew to be Nazis, I have had to deal with people of other races using their race to get out of things, and when I brought the fact that they weren’t doing their job to my bosses attention, they said I was racist.

I currently work in a mixed neighborhood, we have just as many black customers as white, most of my co-workers are black, and I have been told, by not only co-workers, but by customers, that I may be white on the outside but black on the inside.

I find I can fit in with any group of people pretty much, black, white, Jewish, Christian, Pagan, all sexual orientations, I look at myself as a chameleon. I was once accused of being fake, because of my ability to do that, but I’m not fake. I look at it as I have many, many parts of me, and that allows me to fit in with everyone.

Teaching My Daughter My Views

I have raised my daughter to do the same thing, look on the inside, not the outside. If I don’t like you, it has nothing to do with your physical appearance, it has everything to do with your behavior. If you act rude, or ignorant, I’m not going to give you any respect, but if you carry yourself like a decent human being, treating others with kindness and respect, I will treat you the same.

It’s a shame that it is the year 2014, and people are still having to discuss racism. I don’t understand why people have such hatred inside of them. I think that people are people, and everyone is equal.

I think everyone should have the same chances as everyone else, and that there shouldn’t be special treatment for anyone.

I just hope that maybe, this can inspire someone else to think twice before judging someone else. And I’m proud to say that I am “black on the inside”, but to me, I’m just me.

It’s a shame that personality traits are viewed as one race or another, or that people can’t be just viewed as people, but have to be typecast because they can fit in with other people.

Crystal Breger is a white woman in the suburbs of Detroit, which is one of the few metropolitan cities in the country that has a majority of African Americans. She is a wife and mother to one, in a white, monoracial family.

Today’s guest post is from a blogger who I’ve known online for a while. She’s guest posted for me before, here. Jen Marshall Duncan is a teacher, and also mom and wife in a biracial family. She understands racism well enough to teach black students about how to act in a world where they will be judged based on their skin color. She is insightful, articulate and intelligent. I am very glad that she agreed to write another post for me.

I am in my second year of teaching a class full of students who are all young black men. I do not look at the boys in my class and see only their skin color, their sagging pants, or their hoodies. I do not feel fear when they posture, flash signs, or rant about the things that make them angry. (In fact, the white kids I used to teach did the same things.) I do not feel fear when I see young black men at all–I feel love. I want to hug them.

I look at most young black men and feel the same warmth I feel when I see my own son. Then a minute later I feel my whiteness, and I want to apologize on behalf of a society that has all but abandoned them by making assumptions about their worth and their future. I want to teach them to navigate the ways of our predominantly white school/city/state/country.

I say things to my students like, “There are white people who will be afraid of you no matter what just because you are a young black man. You may think it’s not your job to make them feel comfortable, and that it’s not fair that you have to act a certain way. You’re right–it’s not fair. But the fact is that if you don’t try to protect yourself by learning the ways of white society, it can get you in trouble. In this town (state/country), it is proven that your word isn’t as believable as a white person’s.” (Questlove describes the way that feels here.)

Because the truth is exposed time and time again that anyone who is not white or straight or male or well-to-do is treated differently in our society, my class is about practicing how to act.

We practice what to say and what to do in white society that will help us be successful. We practice applying and interviewing for jobs. We practice how to behave in a predominantly white setting. We practice what to do when the police stop them (because the police will stop them).

In short, I try to teach the boys in my class how to protect themselves in a white society that is plagued by racism.

I do the same thing at home when I teach my own biracial children how to navigate a system that doesn’t acknowledge the half of them that is white. Most white people don’t look at my son and say, “There’s a nice white boy,” or even, “Look at that handsome mixed boy!” They see him as a young black man–exactly the same as the boys I teach.

As young black people, there are certain safety lessons that both my children and my students need to learn:

Don’t carry a big bag into a store or you may be accused of theft.

When you’re driving, keep your hands on the wheel if an officer stops you, so he doesn’t think you’re reaching for a weapon.

Always be respectful so no one can arrest you for disorderly conduct when no other charge will stick.

Be smarter, more polite, better than you think you need to be–because it will be hard to make some people believe who you really are.

Sometimes I feel like I am giving my students the key to a locked room, and I know that there are white people out there who would view me as a traitor to my race for giving them that key. I want my students to not only to survive, but to thrive in this world, and I will do whatever I can to help them.

I want them to make it in life with the same fervor that I want my own children to make it. In fact, I care about them like they are my own kids–unconditionally.

And even though it took a while, they feel it. The boys in my class know how much I care, and they reciprocate. One calls me his OG. Another calls me his “white momma.”

I am both honored and a little worried by their nicknames for me. The first time I was called someone’s “OG,” I said, “I am not an OG! I am a middle-aged white woman!”

I am so touched that they think of me as one of their own, but I would never ever presume to be something other than what I am: a white teacher with a black family who sees reality. I care deeply about my students, and I care about trying to right the wrongs of racism.

I am honored that they give me respect and count me as part of their community. At the same time I am totally embarrassed by my privilege.

I didn’t ask to be the one person in the room who has more access to tools of success just because I am white.

I didn’t ask to be the one person in the room who doesn’t get followed around in stores to make sure I’m not shoplifting just because I’m white.

I didn’t ask to be the one person in the room who can drive home every night for years and years without being stopped by a police officer.

I didn’t earn those privileges–yet I have them. That’s embarrassing. Shameful even.

I truly wish I could share more than words and practice sessions with my students. I’d love to share white privilege. Wouldn’t it be something if all white people shared their privilege?

I mean is there a finite amount of the stuff? Will the world run out of privilege if it’s handed out to everyone?

Try to imagine what it would be like if we extended privilege to all. When I do, I see a world based on mutual respect….where I’d need to find some new material to teach in my class…and that would be a very, very good thing.

Jen Marshall Duncan lives in Iowa and blogs at empatheia, where she writes about her experiences in a mixed race marriage, raising 3 biracial children, and her experiences as a teacher of kids who don’t fit into traditional high school settings.